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📈 Insights Roasting on an Open Fire

We're giving you the most interesting facts we gleaned from our survey of 1,000 Americans in 2023

Welcome to Trendlines!

Another year gone and Gradient still doesn’t have a key to the city. Any city. An outdated practice, you say? Tell that to Lionel Messi, who was awarded the key to Fort Lauderdale, or Taylor Swift, who received the key to Tampa, both this year.

It doesn’t take a day job in research to notice a pattern here, so maybe our best bet is to design a MaxDiff ranking orange juice brands or a conjoint revealing the most important aspects of a cruise (oh wait, we already did). Floridian mayors, is this mic even on??

We’ll keep our fingers crossed for a key to the city in 2024, but let’s revisit some of the insights we unlocked for you in 2023: 

  • Despite a years-long pandemic named after it, Corona is Americans’ favorite beer.

  • Surprise! Americans on both sides of the aisle view social security favorably.

  • When it comes to AI, Americans can’t always distinguish between humans and robots.

  • Most Americans’ cartoon preferences can be found in the back of a psychedelic-colored Mystery Machine.

Enjoy reading and happy holidays.

Consumers

The Rebrews Are in: Ranking the Best Beer Brands

The year 2023 marks the 500th anniversary of Reinheitsgebot, the German beer purity law, which mandates that beer is only to be made with four ingredients: malt, hops, yeast, and water. Even non-traditional German beers don’t deviate much from the recipe, typically only swapping malt with rice or maize. So if most beers are relatively similar, do Americans have strong preferences, and, if so, how do consumers choose between brands?

World

RE: FWD: Postponing Pierre's Retirement Party

Earlier this year, French President Emmanuel Macron sidestepped Parliament to unilaterally bump up the retirement age in France from 62 to 64, sparking protests, civil unrest, and labor strikes that left Paris smellier than the Great Camembert Explosion of 1743.

In our own neck of the woods, retiree benefits like Social Security and Medicare have their necks in the guillotine as the national debt limit deadline looms and the GOP-controlled House vows to balance the budget. Yet Americans largely hold favorable views of the program, and (despite the Parisian issue) it’s hardly a partisan issue. And for good reason! The connection between Social Security and birthday checks from Grandma is undeniable.

Tech

It Might Sound Crazy but it Ain’t No Lie, it’s AI AI AI

In a world where Siri can send text messages and AI-generated deepfake videos are making headlines, it's getting harder to tell who's the real deal and who's an imposter. We decided to put the American public to the test by seeing if they could spot the difference between a human-written text and one written by an AI. The results were... well, you'll just have to read on to find out if the machines have finally taken over!

Entertainment

Saturday Morning Fever

You know you’re not a kid anymore when you spend your weekend in the doorknob aisle at Home Depot to see if they have that exact shade of bronze you need (they never do). It’s safe to say we miss the halcyon days when Saturday mornings were spent getting animated about animation: 94% of Americans report watching cartoons at least weekly when they were young, 56% of whom say they were most likely to watch on weekend mornings.

That’s a wrap, folks

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About Gradient

In a continuously changing world, intuition isn't enough. To address this, Gradient partners with startups, Fortune 100 brands, consulting firms, and political campaigns who aren’t confident answering strategic and directional questions. Through our partnership we help these organizations achieve objective clarity by providing custom and actionable insights based on statistical rigor. Want to learn more? Visit our website!

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